United Methodist Communities Earns McKnight’s Excellence in Technology Silver Award
Software tool positively influences resident safety
United Methodist Communities won Silver in the Safety category of the Senior Living track from McKnight’s Excellence in Technology Awards for the benefits of RL Solutions, an online adverse event reporting software tool, which benefits resident safety and health. Implemented in 2016, associates throughout all its full-service and affordable senior housing communities, and homecare services, record adverse occurrences.
Chosen for its user-friendly interface and ease, RL Solutions allows associates to select general event types from an opening screen of icons representing categories: falls; medication events; skin issues; security incidents; infections; equipment and medical device issues; near misses/or “good catches”; human resource issues; Internet Technology problems; documentation issues and medical records requests; and other types of adverse events.
The use of RL Solutions has aided caregivers tremendously in three specific areas. First, the incident report form structure allows system administrators to tailor the questions asked to the specific needs of the communities and caregivers. These in turn, prompt caregivers to take action and answer the mandatory questions within the forms, which positively influences safety as caregivers are required to follow protocols and procedures mandated by the organization.
Second, RL Solutions’ reporting capabilities allow users to measure and track both high-level trends, as well as details on individual adverse events. Report users can generate reports that most closely match their specific needs. What is measured is managed — tracking concerns such as fall, infection control and skin issue rates, positively influences resident safety throughout the organization.
Aggregating online incident reports and generating larger reports demonstrate trends and patterns and proactively pinpoint which places may require extra attention, staffing, and safety precautions.
“These numbers are shared at safety meetings, which occur monthly at all full-service UMC communities, and within daily huddles. These reports are also tailored to Quality Assurance and Performance Improvement (QA PI) needs and the requirements of accountable care organizations,” Elizabeth Andersen, corporate director of compliance and risk management, wrote in the award submission.
Lastly, RL Solutions is user-friendly, allowing and encouraging frontline personnel to enter data quickly and easily. This triggers an instant email notifying the appropriate managers and administrators when these events occur. This process immediately conveys the incident report details when they occur and permits a decision to be made on appropriate follow-up actions, and response to the events before closing the report.
